So, perhaps, maybe, some may have wondered where I’ve been.

Short version, there and back again.

Long version?  Well, if you insist…..

It occurred to me more knowledge of our existence was needed, that I felt incomplete, and thus began the journey.

I traveled far and wide, to many exotic ports of call, to strange lands and even stranger people, finally seeking places of knowledge and spiritual power as somewhere a clue could be found, like crime scenes with scraps of evidence laying about.

Finally, I found myself in an ancient dusty temple of unknown origin, descending a dark narrow passegeway, unable to see beyond the low glow of the torch light.

Abruptly, I was brought up short when the way came to an end against a wall with an ancient carved design.  It seemed to tell a story of a hero fighting a great beast, and afterwards finding a holy treasure.

As my hands traced out the lines of the carving, I found an indentation that seemed to move. Pressing harder set a series of invisible gears and pulleys in action and the wall swung away and as I stepped forward into the dark found the floor disappearing underneath me.  The descent was fast and furious and very rough, making me lose my breath and leaving me dazed.

In the complete blackness, I regained my footing and percieved a slight glow off in the distance. I had no choice but to move towards the light. With each step, fearing each would be my last after plunging into an imagined abyss, I grew closer and the light stronger. My steps grew quicker as I could finally make out the path.

As I drew closer, the view before me was like that in the carving.  A series of pillars with glowing objects on the top giving out their light.  I then realized that there was a low rumbling noise growing louder, nearer. Now I understood the meaning of the carving. I quickly looked about for some sort of weapon and noticed a set of armor again the bottom of one of the pillars, a set with their former inhabitant still in them, or at least what was left of them. peeling off what was salvageable I took stock.  Sword, bow, a few arrows and the well worn armor.

Now the rumbling had grown to a roar and screech that shook the very bones in my head and made my heart stop.  There was no way out but through the nightmare, through the beast and beyond.

As the creature swooped past and let loose a torrent of seering flame, I could see that the previous warrior had left his mark on the beast.  It was carrying several arrows already and had many gaps in its hide. I could see that it seemed to stay close to the glowing crystals at the top of the pillars and gain strength by them.

Remembering what I saw in the carving, it flashed into my mind what it was I needed to do. Climbing the rough side of the tallest pillar, I had to stop several time to cling tightly and hope the beast did not see me ascending. Finally, the top was mine. Taking careful aim since I only had a limited number of arrows, I let fly an arrow at the nearest crystal. It shattered with an enormous burst of energy followed by a pained howl from the beast as if it was connected somehow. My aim was true again and again, but I was getting low on arrows when the beast seemed to realize the source of his agony. Charging at me while I was trying to fire at the last crystal caused me to lose my balance and the shot went wide.

Quickly reloading I drew my aim. The beast turned and charged again. I forced myself to focus and try and ignore the oncoming mountain of destruction and let my shot fly.

I couldn’t tell which was louder, the last explosion of the crystal or the screams of the monster. Settling to the center of the pillars, the beast seemed out of its ability to fly or move so I made the descent to the bottom and slowly approached, sword in hand. I almost felt pity for the poor creature, until I remembered the state of the last owner of this armor. Quickly and humanely as possible, I put the beast out of its misery and it dissolved into a blaze of blinding light.

When all was done, it was strangely quiet. Looking about I wondered what would happen next. Eventually, it occured to me that there was a new object in the center, or was it there before and I just hadn’t noticed? Hard to say, but now it seemed to almost glow and was like a well with a strange center.  Peering closer, it seemed I was staring into the depths of the universe. The stars grew larger and started to swirl. I could not tear my eyes away and I seemed to be caught in a whirlpool, pulling me in.  Losing my balance, I fall…..

……

and fall…..

……

and fall……

……

…

I see the player you mean.

Kanube?

Yes. Take care. It has reached a higher level now. It can read our thoughts.

That doesn’t matter. It thinks we are part of the game.

I like this player. It played well. It did not give up.

It is reading our thoughts as though they were words on a screen.

That is how it chooses to imagine many things, when it is deep in the dream of a game.

Words make a wonderful interface. Very flexible. And less terrifying than staring at the reality behind the screen.

They used to hear voices. Before players could read. Back in the days when those who did not play called the players witches, and warlocks. And players dreamed they flew through the air, on sticks powered by demons.

What did this player dream?

This player dreamed of sunlight and trees. Of fire and water. It dreamed it created. And it dreamed it destroyed. It dreamed it hunted, and was hunted. It dreamed of shelter.

Hah, the original interface. A million years old, and it still works. But what true structure did this player create, in the reality behind the screen?

It worked, with a million others, to sculpt a true world in a fold of the [Scrambled], and created a [Scrambled] for [Scrambled], in the [Scrambled].

It cannot read that thought.

No. It has not yet achieved the highest level. That, it must achieve in the long dream of life, not the short dream of a game.

Does it know that we love it? That the universe is kind?

Sometimes, through the noise of its thoughts, it hears the universe, yes.

But there are times it is sad, in the long dream. It creates worlds that have no summer, and it shivers under a black sun, and it takes its sad creation for reality.

To cure it of sorrow would destroy it. The sorrow is part of its own private task. We cannot interfere.

Sometimes when they are deep in dreams, I want to tell them, they are building true worlds in reality. Sometimes I want to tell them of their importance to the universe. Sometimes, when they have not made a true connection in a while, I want to help them to speak the word they fear.

It reads our thoughts.

Sometimes I do not care. Sometimes I wish to tell them, this world you take for truth is merely [Scrambled] and [Scrambled], I wish to tell them that they are [Scrambled] in the [Scrambled]. They see so little of reality, in their long dream.

And yet they play the game.

But it would be so easy to tell them…

Too strong for this dream. To tell them how to live is to prevent them living.

I will not tell the player how to live.

The player is growing restless.

I will tell the player a story.

But not the truth.

No. A story that contains the truth safely, in a cage of words. Not the naked truth that can burn over any distance.

Give it a body, again.

Yes. Player…

Use its name.

Kanube. Player of games.

Good.

Take a breath, now. Take another. Feel air in your lungs. Let your limbs return. Yes, move your fingers. Have a body again, under gravity, in air. Respawn in the long dream. There you are. Your body touching the universe again at every point, as though you were separate things. As though we were separate things.

Who are we? Once we were called the spirit of the mountain. Father sun, mother moon. Ancestral spirits, animal spirits. Jinn. Ghosts. The green man. Then gods, demons. Angels. Poltergeists. Aliens, extraterrestrials. Leptons, quarks. The words change. We do not change.

We are the universe. We are everything you think isn’t you. You are looking at us now, through your skin and your eyes. And why does the universe touch your skin, and throw light on you? To see you, player. To know you. And to be known. I shall tell you a story.

Once upon a time, there was a player.

The player was you, Kanube.

Sometimes it thought itself human, on the thin crust of a spinning globe of molten rock. The ball of molten rock circled a ball of blazing gas that was three hundred and thirty thousand times more massive than it. They were so far apart that light took eight minutes to cross the gap. The light was information from a star, and it could burn your skin from a hundred and fifty million kilometres away.

Sometimes the player dreamed it was a miner, on the surface of a world that was flat, and infinite. The sun was a square of white. The days were short; there was much to do; and death was a temporary inconvenience.

Sometimes the player dreamed it was lost in a story.

Sometimes the player dreamed it was other things, in other places. Sometimes these dreams were disturbing. Sometimes very beautiful indeed. Sometimes the player woke from one dream into another, then woke from that into a third.

Sometimes the player dreamed it watched words on a screen.

Let’s go back.

The atoms of the player were scattered in the grass, in the rivers, in the air, in the ground. A woman gathered the atoms; she drank and ate and inhaled; and the woman assembled the player, in her body.

And the player awoke, from the warm, dark world of its mother’s body, into the long dream.

And the player was a new story, never told before, written in letters of DNA. And the player was a new program, never run before, generated by a sourcecode a billion years old. And the player was a new human, never alive before, made from nothing but milk and love.

You are the player. The story. The program. The human. Made from nothing but milk and love.

Let’s go further back.

The seven billion billion billion atoms of the player’s body were created, long before this game, in the heart of a star. So the player, too, is information from a star. And the player moves through a story, which is a forest of information planted by a man called Julian, on a flat, infinite world created by a man called Markus, that exists inside a small, private world created by the player, who inhabits a universe created by…

Shush. Sometimes the player created a small, private world that was soft and warm and simple. Sometimes hard, and cold, and complicated. Sometimes it built a model of the universe in its head; flecks of energy, moving through vast empty spaces. Sometimes it called those flecks “electrons” and “protons”.

Sometimes it called them “planets” and “stars”.

Sometimes it believed it was in a universe that was made of energy that was made of offs and ons; zeros and ones; lines of code. Sometimes it believed it was playing a game. Sometimes it believed it was reading words on a screen.

You are the player, reading words…

Shush… Sometimes the player read lines of code on a screen. Decoded them into words; decoded words into meaning; decoded meaning into feelings, emotions, theories, ideas, and the player started to breathe faster and deeper and realised it was alive, it was alive, those thousand deaths had not been real, the player was alive

You. You. You are alive.

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the sunlight that came through the shuffling leaves of the summer trees

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the light that fell from the crisp night sky of winter, where a fleck of light in the corner of the player’s eye might be a star a million times as massive as the sun, boiling its planets to plasma in order to be visible for a moment to the player, walking home at the far side of the universe, suddenly smelling food, almost at the familiar door, about to dream again

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the zeros and ones, through the electricity of the world, through the scrolling words on a screen at the end of a dream

and the universe said I love you

and the universe said you have played the game well

and the universe said everything you need is within you

and the universe said you are stronger than you know

and the universe said you are the daylight

and the universe said you are the night

and the universe said the darkness you fight is within you

and the universe said the light you seek is within you

and the universe said you are not alone

and the universe said you are not separate from every other thing

and the universe said you are the universe tasting itself, talking to itself, reading its own code

and the universe said I love you because you are love.

And the game was over and the player woke up from the dream. And the player began a new dream. And the player dreamed again, dreamed better. And the player was the universe. And the player was love.

You are the player.

Wake up.

…….

…….

now, it is my understanding that this seems familiar to many of you, and some of you may have even had this dream, experience, awakening, yourself.  This is simply one re-telling of an old tale.

and so, it seems the concepts of Endism are even found in the familiar voices of the agents of the creator.

I am wiser for the journey.  I am glad you traveled with me. Perhaps one day, I shall return to that place,

for good.